The bed is shaking with a fast twitch horizontal motion. I had taken my mobile device, an inexpensive Samsung droid, out to the truck for charging. As a result I had no idea what time it was, something that further frustrates me as now I have no accurate reference with which to match my experience to reality. On Sunday Alaska registered a 7.0 quake and they are just up the continental highway from us. I am house sitting, sleeping in a strange bed with an exotic dog under my care upstairs, and hopefully sound asleep. She doesn’t bark so I have no indication if there is anything abnormal taking place. She HAD been acting a touch odd earlier in the evening, skittish, amped up from her normal curled up by the couch docile demeanor. I am considering all this as the darkness closes in around me and the bed continues its eerie shake. Earthquake is my conclusion. Big one.
In the midst of this chaotic dream-state I suddenly realize that I am in danger. Not so much from the seismic vibration and its potential devastation but because there is another energy field present. There is somebody here. Along with this comes the realization that I am responsible for the house and more importantly the dog. Ask any pet owner entrusting the protection of property and pet to a temporary proxy which is more important and they will all, every one of them, and without exception, say that if the house is on fire, rescue the dog and then call 911. IN THAT ORDER.
I am now losing the battle to regain consciousness. This has happened a couple of times before but the occasions when I felt paralyzed, unable to move, half dead and half awake are very rare. Using night vision peripheral optics I can sense the outline of the visitor. It is a woman, tall and slender with close cropped curls, like Olive Oil in the Popeye cartoons. She is not threatening and seems to be looking at the book that I borrowed from the library of the house owner, and is now laying on the nightstand. The book is by a female author on the subject of writing.
As I watch her, I am fighting the battle to move and then to wake and then to act. We are, after all in the middle of a quake and I need to ensure the safety of the dog who for all I know needs emergency response. But I still can’t move. I try to shout to her, calling her name but the more I try to audiblize to more it indicates that I am in bad shape. I must help myself first before I can help anyone else, so I make another assessment of the situation and decide that I need to relax. The bed has ceased shaking and I consider that it may have been the result of a dream and not actual seismic activity. Maybe it’s OK I think, just another weird nightmare. The image of the ghost woman at bedside returns and I can now turn my head enough to take a peek, making sure I open just one eye ever so slightly to see. She is gone.
I wiggle a toe and then a finger and take another deep breath. All I hear is the hum from the refrigerator motor down the hall. It is quiet. Still. I review the scene once more trying to understand its reality and know that I must face the uncertainty of the low-grade phantom danger, get up, go upstairs and conduct a damage report. If I owned a Glock 9 I would have grabbed it.
I stealthily walk down the hall and up the stairs. All the lights are on and I wonder if I left them on or if they have been automatically engaged by a power outage and subsequent ignition of the emergency backup generator. The first room on the main floor is the media room, as instructed I leave the big screen on at night at low volume to keep the dog company. It is on MSNBC right where I signed off after Lawrence O’Donnell’s Last Word.
They are talking about the Alaska earthquake and aftershocks. I look down the hall and see the dog standing and staring at me. She cocks her head slightly as if to say, “You OK?’
Deep breath. Yeah, let’s have a snack.
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